Oh My Fur and Whiskers

by Donna Poole

Who are all these people? And why do their titles all end in “ologist”? John and I never expected so many ologists to become part of our lives when we said “I do” fifty-plus years ago, but here they all are. The Cambridge English Dictionary defines ologist as “an expert in a particular area of scientific study.”

 Let me introduce you to our ologists. We know a few self-proclaimed gemologists. If the next pandemic happens, they will darkly say, “Don’t say we didn’t warn you.” We can’t really get rid of them; a few of them are family members!

We have a favorite meteorologist; you can find him on Facebook if you’re interested, Meteorologist Ross Ellet. We don’t mind sharing life with him; we voluntarily check his page almost daily. We think it would be fun to know a zoologist, but most of our ologists aren’t the fun variety, and we don’t visit them voluntarily.

Between us, John and I have seen dermatologists, several cardiologists, a nephrologist, four neurologists, a neuropsychologist, a hematologist, a pulmonologist, a gastroenterologist and two ophthalmologists. Throw in a few surgeons, orthopedic and neuro, sprinkle with a few anesthesiologists, radiologists, physical therapists, phlebotomists, and nurses who administer infusions, and you about have the story of our social lives.

Our favorite doctors are our family doctors. We used to call them family doctors; now all our specialists ask, “Who is your primary care physician?” So, I guess the correct term now is PCP.

Whatever you call them, John and I love our at-home doctors and wish we could see just them and not our plethora of ologists, but as one nurse candidly remarked when I said that, “Well, then you would be dead.” So, there is that.

Our primary care physician’s job is to diagnose us and hand us off to the ologists; we understand that, but what happened to the good old days of Marcus Welby, MD?

Marcus Welby, AKA Robert Young, was a family doctor. He knew his patients by name and made house calls. Just his smile and voice were enough to calm fears. That television show was a favorite of many from 1969-1976 when days were simpler. True, in 1976 the average man lived only 69.1 years and the average woman 76.8 years. Now, according to stastita.com, the average male in North America lives 76 years and the average female 81 years, so I guess we’ve made progress with all our ologists.

Still, Marcus Welby would die of a coughing fit if he saw the complicated ICD-10-CM system doctors must now use to report to insurance companies. The old ICD-9-CM system had 13,000 codes; the new ICD-10 expanded to 68,000 codes. John’s cardiologist says it’s a pain in the place where you sit down; only those aren’t his exact words. I understand that the 68,000 codes have their place; the ICD-10 reportedly has fewer rejected insurance claims. But they sure aren’t back country simple; they are like Carmel, Indiana with its 125 roundabouts, more than any other city in the world. Carmel says it has reduced injury accidents by 80 percent. Our country dirt road couldn’t handle the traffic load of Carmel, or Chicago, or New York City.

Some things just can’t be simplified; we need all our ologists if we want to live and thrive until ninety-five. And so, when we must, John and I regretfully drive down our dirt road, leave the sanity and solitude of countryside behind, and head to the insanity of Ann Arbor or Lansing. We see more traffic on one of those doctor or hospital visits than we probably do in a year at home.

When we get stuck in the inevitable traffic, one of us always says to the other, “How do people live like this?”

And yet, we’re grateful they do. Those ologists have saved our lives more than once, or rather, God has used them to do that.

We submit to the unavoidable; we sometimes must go to big city doctors and hospitals, and if ever we visit Carmel, Indiana, we’ll have to take a roundabout, though just thinking about that gives me nightmares. I’m not putting a visit to Carmel on my bucket list.

I’m no a city girl. When we leave cities, roundabouts, and interstates behind and see open fields, I feel my shoulders relax. I can breathe again.

There will be interstate days for all of us when there’s barely time to breathe, when life seems nothing but driving from one ologist to the next, from one roundabout to the next, from one obligation to the next. But do you ever wonder if we’re getting hooked on our own adrenaline? Do we sometimes drive life’s interstate even when we could take a backcountry road?

Long ago I determined to leave a margin around the pages of my days, a little room to breathe. John and I promised each other to do that, but life’s demands grew, and we can’t do things as quickly as we used to. We find ourselves working early, late, and in between, and seldom taking a day off.

I see many others in the same situation. Like the frazzled White Rabbit in Alice in Wonderland, too many of us drive frantically from one roundabout to the next muttering, “Oh, my fur and whiskers! I’m late. I’m late!”

What good does it do to live on a backcountry road and live an interstate life?

So, here I am, the ripe young age of seventy-one, just now figuring out if I’m going to get off the interstate and live a country road life, I’m going to have to leave some things undone. You too?

It’s not our location that determines our lifestyle. We can enjoy a country road life if we live in a high rise in the city; we can endure an interstate life if we live on three-hundred isolated acres in Wyoming.

We don’t want to mess life up because we only get one shot. I’m not encouraging laziness. Life is short; we want to finish well, but even Jesus told His disciples to come apart and rest awhile. It might be tricky figuring out a balance between hard work and rest, but we can at least try.

We can start with this ancient prayer: “Oh Lord, may I be directed what to do and what to leave undone.” – Elizabeth Fry (1780-1845)

I don’t suppose we can fire any of our ologists, but maybe we can take time for a picnic on the way home? Oh, my fur and whiskers, a picnic sounds just lovely. I think I’ll pack a book.